Judgment

Sanjay Dhar, J.—Through the medium of instant petition, the petitioner-Institute has challenged order dated 07.08.2020 passed by respondent No.4 whereby a decision has been taken to consider the case of the petitioner-Institute for grant of affiliation for the next session i.e. 2020-22 subject to the production of fresh NOC from the Government. A direction, asking the respondents to grant affiliation to the petitioner-Institute for running the Diploma in Elementary Education course during the Session 2019-21 or, in the alternative to pay the compensation to the tune of Rs.50.00 lacs to the petitioner-Institute, has also been sought.

2. It is the case of the petitioner that it is an Institute established in accordance with law for imparting Elementary Teachers Training Course which is now called as ‘Diploma in Elementary Education’. It is averred that after fulfilling the requisite norms and guidelines, the petitioner-Institute was granted NOC by the Government which was valid for one academic session, whereafter the same came to be extended from time to time on deposition of requisite fee. It is the case of the petitioner-Institute that it has been granted NOC by the Government for the session 2019-21 as well, whereafter it approached the respondent-Board i.e., J&K Board of School Education for grant of affiliation for the session 2019-21. It is alleged that the respondents did not conduct any inspection of the petitioner-Institute for more than one month and after conducting the inspection, certain deficiencies were pointed out which were immediately rectified by the petitioner-Institute. It is further averred that the petitioner-Institute was permitted to participate in the counseling process provisionally along with other nine Institutes in terms of the communication dated 20.12.2019 issued by respondent No.4.

3. The Affiliation Committee is stated to have considered the matter pertaining to the petitioner-Institute on 10.02.2020 and it was observed that the inspection team had recommended that the affiliation be granted to the petitioner-Institute for the session 2019-21 with a condition that it will remove all the deficiencies pointed out by the Inspection Committee within a period of two months and, accordingly, an inspection team was also constituted to verify status regarding removal of the deficiencies. The Affiliation Committee deferred the conditional recommendations of the inspection team so as to get the matter regarding removal of deficiencies verified through a team of officers, to be appointed by the Chairman. It is averred by the petitioner-Institute that it kept on approaching the respondents a number of times as the career of 120 candidates, who were allocated to the petitioner-Institute, was at stake, but no action was taken by the respondents compelling the petitioner-Institute to file a writ petition bearing WP(C) No.1080/2020, wherein it was pleaded that the petitioner-Institute had removed the deficiencies.

4. Vide order dated 16.07.2020 passed by this Court in the aforesaid writ petition, the respondents were directed to determine the eligibility of the petitioner-Institute for grant of affiliation for the session 2019-21 within a period of two weeks. It is alleged that in spite of this order, the matter was not considered by the respondents and ultimately, the impugned order came to be passed whereby it was provided that the case of affiliation of petitioner-Institute will be considered for the session 2020-22 and not for the session 2019-21.

5. The aforesaid decision of the respondents has been challenged by the petitioner on the grounds that the impugned order is actuated with mala fide as so many other similarly situated Institutes have been granted affiliation by the respondents; that despite the petitioner-Institute making good all the deficiencies, the respondents did not constitute